China is to become urbanised within the next five years.
China, the world's largest nation, which is expected to overtake the US as the world's biggest superpower within the next couple of decades, is experiencing an industrial revolution - with its manufacturing might, entrepreneurship and rapidly growing cities - similar to that which occurred in Britain 200 years ago.
Just 30 years ago China was a largely peasant society. But now, this gargantuan nation has over 160 cities with populations of a million or more.
Li Bin, director of China's National Population and Family Planning Commission, said that 700 million Chinese people will be living in the cities by 2015, representing just over half of the country's 1,390 million people.
The scale of China's economic success is mind-boggling. The country now has 400 million internet users - which is higher than the population of every country on Earth except China and India.
However, the World Bank is predicting that China's economic growth is slowing down - it expects the economy to grow by "just" 7% each year until 2020. It is just a matter of time that China's economy overtakes that of the US.
The first country in the world to have the majority of its people living in towns and cities rather than rural areas was Britain, which became urbanised in the year 1850.
China to become urban country by 2015
By Peter Foster in Beijing
04 Jul 2010
The Telegraph
Over 150 years after Britain, China is about to become an urban country Photo: SOHO CHINA
More than half of all Chinese will be living in cities by 2015 for the first time in history as industralisation drives the greatest migration from countryside to towns ever seen.
Over the past 30 years China has moved from a predominantly peasant society to a country with more than 160 cities of 1m people or more.
Li Bin, director of China's National Population and Family Planning Commission, said that 700m Chinese people will be living in the cities by 2015, representing a shade over half the projected population of 1.39bn.
The rapid pace of Chinese moving to industrial hubs for better-paying factory jobs has posed growing challenges for government managers.
A chronic shortage of affordable housing, low wages, a rise in violent crime and a widening gap between rich and poor all contribute to an estimated 100,000 demonstrations a year.
A London chimney sweep with his boy helper, 1877
The world's first urbanised country was Britain. In 1750, just 15% of the population of Britain lived in towns and cities, but this figure surpassed the 50% in 1850. Just as in China right now, which is experiencing its own industrial revolution, million of Britons in the early 1800s moved out of rural areas and into the cities to look for jobs in the new cotton and wool mills that were springing up. Like China now, Britain was a manufacturing powerhouse, known as "The Workshop of the World." Cotton was spun in Lancashire and wool was spun in Yorkshire. As a result, northern English towns and cities were dotted with hundreds of "dark, satanic mills", belching out so much black smoke into the air that the brickwork of many buildings todays remain blackened with soot. Even children were employed in the cotton and wool mills, some being used as "scavengers" to crawl underneath the dangerous machinery and sweep up any fallen pieces of threads. People losing fingers and hands was a common occurrence. In 1842 it was decided that women and children would no longer work down the mines. In 1871, two-thirds of the British population was employed in manufacturing.
In recent weeks a series of strikes across China's car and technology factories has seen young workers demand higher wages to offset rising inflation.
China's urbanisation has also seen a massive jump in internet usage to 400m online users this year; a phenomenon that has broadened previously narrow horizons, increasing demands on the State and giving workers a vital tool to organise protests.
The relative shortage of labour is also expected to constrain China's economic growth in the coming decade, with the World Bank estimating that China's GDP growth will slow to 7 per cent a year by 2020, compared with almost 10 per cent between 1995-2009.
The slowing of overall growth will in turn make it harder for China to generate the millions of jobs it requires to maintain a constant rate of employment, adding to social pressures in the cities.
And although China – unlike India – has managed its mass urbanisation without creating slums, it faces growing discontent from migrants to the cities who still have a rural registration document, that means they are still not entitled to many basic services.
China is currently pilot-testing a relaxation of the registration rules but the changes are not coming fast enough for organisations like the World Bank that argue reform will help speed up the creation of a new class of urban consumers.
The shift to the city, as well as fuelling urban tensions, has also created problems for China's villages, which have been described as being on a 'wartime footing', with all the able-bodied men and women away, leaving just young children and old people behind.
The shortage of parent-age adults in China's villages has also been linked to a possible decline in literacy in China which some analysts predict could have long-term consequences for China's ability to shift its economy into more advanced manufacturing and services.
dailymail.co.uk
China, the world's largest nation, which is expected to overtake the US as the world's biggest superpower within the next couple of decades, is experiencing an industrial revolution - with its manufacturing might, entrepreneurship and rapidly growing cities - similar to that which occurred in Britain 200 years ago.
Just 30 years ago China was a largely peasant society. But now, this gargantuan nation has over 160 cities with populations of a million or more.
Li Bin, director of China's National Population and Family Planning Commission, said that 700 million Chinese people will be living in the cities by 2015, representing just over half of the country's 1,390 million people.
The scale of China's economic success is mind-boggling. The country now has 400 million internet users - which is higher than the population of every country on Earth except China and India.
However, the World Bank is predicting that China's economic growth is slowing down - it expects the economy to grow by "just" 7% each year until 2020. It is just a matter of time that China's economy overtakes that of the US.
The first country in the world to have the majority of its people living in towns and cities rather than rural areas was Britain, which became urbanised in the year 1850.
China to become urban country by 2015
By Peter Foster in Beijing
04 Jul 2010
The Telegraph
Over 150 years after Britain, China is about to become an urban country Photo: SOHO CHINA
More than half of all Chinese will be living in cities by 2015 for the first time in history as industralisation drives the greatest migration from countryside to towns ever seen.
Over the past 30 years China has moved from a predominantly peasant society to a country with more than 160 cities of 1m people or more.
Li Bin, director of China's National Population and Family Planning Commission, said that 700m Chinese people will be living in the cities by 2015, representing a shade over half the projected population of 1.39bn.
The rapid pace of Chinese moving to industrial hubs for better-paying factory jobs has posed growing challenges for government managers.
A chronic shortage of affordable housing, low wages, a rise in violent crime and a widening gap between rich and poor all contribute to an estimated 100,000 demonstrations a year.
A London chimney sweep with his boy helper, 1877
The world's first urbanised country was Britain. In 1750, just 15% of the population of Britain lived in towns and cities, but this figure surpassed the 50% in 1850. Just as in China right now, which is experiencing its own industrial revolution, million of Britons in the early 1800s moved out of rural areas and into the cities to look for jobs in the new cotton and wool mills that were springing up. Like China now, Britain was a manufacturing powerhouse, known as "The Workshop of the World." Cotton was spun in Lancashire and wool was spun in Yorkshire. As a result, northern English towns and cities were dotted with hundreds of "dark, satanic mills", belching out so much black smoke into the air that the brickwork of many buildings todays remain blackened with soot. Even children were employed in the cotton and wool mills, some being used as "scavengers" to crawl underneath the dangerous machinery and sweep up any fallen pieces of threads. People losing fingers and hands was a common occurrence. In 1842 it was decided that women and children would no longer work down the mines. In 1871, two-thirds of the British population was employed in manufacturing.
In recent weeks a series of strikes across China's car and technology factories has seen young workers demand higher wages to offset rising inflation.
China's urbanisation has also seen a massive jump in internet usage to 400m online users this year; a phenomenon that has broadened previously narrow horizons, increasing demands on the State and giving workers a vital tool to organise protests.
The relative shortage of labour is also expected to constrain China's economic growth in the coming decade, with the World Bank estimating that China's GDP growth will slow to 7 per cent a year by 2020, compared with almost 10 per cent between 1995-2009.
The slowing of overall growth will in turn make it harder for China to generate the millions of jobs it requires to maintain a constant rate of employment, adding to social pressures in the cities.
And although China – unlike India – has managed its mass urbanisation without creating slums, it faces growing discontent from migrants to the cities who still have a rural registration document, that means they are still not entitled to many basic services.
China is currently pilot-testing a relaxation of the registration rules but the changes are not coming fast enough for organisations like the World Bank that argue reform will help speed up the creation of a new class of urban consumers.
The shift to the city, as well as fuelling urban tensions, has also created problems for China's villages, which have been described as being on a 'wartime footing', with all the able-bodied men and women away, leaving just young children and old people behind.
The shortage of parent-age adults in China's villages has also been linked to a possible decline in literacy in China which some analysts predict could have long-term consequences for China's ability to shift its economy into more advanced manufacturing and services.
dailymail.co.uk
